Thursday, July 26, 2007

Myopia

Myopia is a public health problem in Singapore, where many are afflicted by it. Surveys conducted here have indicated that it affects about 25% of 7 year olds, 33% of 9 year olds, 50% of 12 year olds and more than 80% of 18 year old males in Singapore.

It has been found that the earlier the onset of myopia, the worse the final outcome will be. We have been trying to encourage our children to take part in active "eye health care", where we insist that they take eye breaks after every half an hour of computer time, as well the encourage them to just "get out" and play in the garden, cloud gaze, or admire the boats out at sea.

Recently, my daughter S, (11 years) was tested by the School health service and found to be myopic. At the last test (12 months ago) she still had perfect eyesight. I have been keeping my fingers crossed for my children to have perfect eyesight. You see, my hubby has perfect eyesight. I had perfect eyesight until age 24. As a result of too much computer work in the office then, my eyesight started deteriorating. Fortunately, I am not severly myopic. (So, my myopia was the result of an occupational hazard, but unfortunately I was not compensated for it!!)

S, has had quite a bit of school work that required computer time recently, and I really believe that that is the cause of her deteriorating eyesight. There are times when I am not vigilant enough to enforce the "eye breaks" and she, who is usually quite diligent at keeping to such things, got carried away working on her work.

So, looks like she is now part of those statistics! So everyone, remember, 3 to 5 minutes of eye breaks after 30 minutes of near work, especially computer work. And we bloggers can really get carried away on the computer! Take care!

Our whole family of 4 are myopic. Mine used to be the most severe. I had cataract operations done on both eyes nearly 10 years ago where the surgeon inserted an intra-ocular lens implant into each eye to replace the natural lens. The degree of each implanted lens was calculated to compensate for the shortsightedness of the eye. Immediately after the operation my eyesight was almost perfect. Now, after so many years of computer work, the shortsightedness is creeping back again although it is not very severe.

My first operation was carried out to remove an early cataract in my left eye. The motive was hence pathological and not actually to correct refractive errors. However, I was so impressed with the results that I asked the surgeon if he could operate on my healthy right eye as well. Although he said that it was against medical ethics to operate on a healthy eye, he made an exception for me and acceded to my request.

Yes, I heard recent news that there is an improved lens implant that acts like a multifocal lens, allowing the eye to accommodate, i.e. to view both near and distant objects clearly. So correcting long-sightedness shouldn't be any problem, I guess.